Connecting Your IDE

While you can edit files via SSH using vim or nano, most developers prefer using their IDE. DevDocker supports remote development with popular IDEs.

Option 1: VSCode (Recommended)

VSCode provides excellent remote development support via SSH:

1. Install Remote-SSH extension:

• Open VSCode
• Press Ctrl+Shift+X (Extensions)
• Search for “Remote - SSH”
• Click Install

2. Configure SSH connection (if you haven’t already):

Run the SSH config setup utility on your host:

$ ./scripts/setup-ssh-config.sh

This script will:

• Detect your SSH keys
• Let you select which key to use
• Create or update your ~/.ssh/config file

3. Connect:

• Press Ctrl+Shift+P (Command Palette)
• Type “Remote-SSH: Connect to Host”
• Select “devdocker”
• A new window opens connected to the container

4. Install the Java extension pack:

• Once connected, open the Extensions panel — it’s already scoped to the remote (look for the “SSH: devdocker” section header)
• Search for “Extension Pack for Java” and click Install
• Often you won’t need to search manually at all: opening the GeoServer folder (next step) triggers a popup offering to install the recommended extension for you

5. Open workspace:

• File → Open Folder
• Navigate to /workspace/geoserver
• Click OK

Tip: Avoid opening the entire /workspace/geoserver folder if you’re not using a pre-warmed image — it contains around 300 Maven modules and can take 60+ minutes to import. Opening /workspace/geoserver/src/web/app instead gets you editing and debugging in a couple of minutes.

You now have full IDE access with syntax highlighting, code completion, and integrated terminal.

Option 2: Kiro IDE

Follow the same steps as VSCode (Kiro uses the same Remote-SSH extension).

Option 3: IntelliJ IDEA

Requires an IntelliJ IDEA Ultimate license. Remote development into a container — whether via the older Build, Execution, Deployment → Deployment (SFTP) settings page, or via JetBrains Gateway — is an Ultimate-only feature; Community Edition cannot be used as the remote backend either way. If you only have Community Edition, use VSCode or Kiro instead (Option 1) — there’s currently no free way to do this workflow in IntelliJ IDEA itself.

If you have Ultimate, use JetBrains Gateway — it runs the actual IDE on the container and streams a thin client to your machine:

1. Install JetBrains Gateway:

• Via JetBrains Toolbox App, or standalone from jetbrains.com

2. Configure SSH connection (if you haven’t already):

Run the SSH config setup utility on your host:

$ ./scripts/setup-ssh-config.sh

This script will:

• Detect your SSH keys
• Let you select which key to use
• Create or update your ~/.ssh/config file

3. Connect over SSH:

• Launch Gateway → New Connection → SSH
• Select the “devdocker” host entry created in the previous step — Gateway reads ~/.ssh/config, so it should already be listed

4. Choose the IDE backend:

• Select IntelliJ IDEA Ultimate (version 2024.3 or newer)

5. Open the project:

• Point Gateway at /workspace/geoserver/src/web/app, not the full /workspace/geoserver folder.

Tip: Avoid opening the entire /workspace/geoserver folder if you’re not using a pre-warmed image — it contains around 300 Maven modules and can take 60+ minutes for IntelliJ’s indexer to import. Opening /workspace/geoserver/src/web/app instead gets you editing and debugging in a couple of minutes.

Gateway downloads the IDE backend into the container on first connect, then opens a thin client that behaves like a full local IntelliJ. Since the backend and the GeoServer JVM both run inside the same container, remote debugging via JDWP is simpler to set up than an external debugger — no separate port-forwarding step needed.